{"id":4856,"date":"2015-09-25T06:55:11","date_gmt":"2015-09-25T10:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=4856"},"modified":"2015-10-19T08:48:42","modified_gmt":"2015-10-19T12:48:42","slug":"baby-doll-mccarter-theatres-season-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=4856","title":{"rendered":"Baby Doll–McCarter Theatre’s Season Opener"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Baby

Hoffman and McDermott in Baby Doll<\/p><\/div>\n

Perhaps Tennessee Williams and comedy don\u2019t usually share your same mind-space, but here is a comedy-drama rather neglected in the back of his vast repository of work. Princeton\u2019s McCarter Theatre<\/a> (link includes a behind the scenes video) has found it, resurrected it, and mounted it in an exciting production on view through October 11.<\/p>\n

The play, Baby Doll<\/em>, was always a mashup. It began with two one-acts (\u201c27 Wagons Full of Cotton\u201d and one with a title something like \u201cThe Dinner Nobody Wanted\u201d). It was turned into a script for a 1956 Elia Kazan movie starring Caroll Baker, Karl Malden, an Elie Wallach in his first movie role. That version went through many Kazan-initiated revisions and excited much Church opposition for its racy content\u2014tame today compared to prime time tv. Williams later wrote a full-length stage play based on the screenplay, Tiger Tail<\/em>, that had a short Broadway run in 1999. But generally, the project lay neglected.<\/p>\n

Recently, it was retranslated and revived in France by Pierre Laville, and when McCarter\u2019s Emily Mann read Laville\u2019s version, she saw great potential. She and Laville share \u201cadapted for the stage\u201d credits, as further work had to be done by Mann to reflect American perspectives, particularly regarding race relations in Mississippi in the early 1950s. Miraculously, two weeks before rehearsals began, Mann discovered in Princeton University\u2019s Firestone Library the original movie script by Williams, as he wrote it before Kazan\u2019s \u201chelp.\u201d More revisions ensued.<\/p>\n

\u201cBaby Doll\u201d is a 19-year-old beauty, married to a much older man, Archie Lee Meighan and living in a falling-apart plantation house (handsome stage set). Baby Doll thought she was not \u201cready for marriage\u201d at age 18. Although the wedding took place then, it is yet to be consummated (she still sleeps in her crib), according to the deal she, Archie Lee, and her father made before his death. The waiting\u2014which is to end in two more days when Baby Doll turns 20\u2014is driving Archie crazy. He both loves and lusts after her, feelings she does not return.<\/p>\n

Archie Lee is nearly destitute, having lost his cotton gin business to the nearby Syndicate plantation, and Baby Doll is furious that the house\u2019s furniture is repossessed. When the Syndicate\u2019s gin is destroyed in a not-so-mysterious fire, the young plant manager, handsome Silva Vacarro, pays the Meighans a visit, bringing with him 27 wagons full of cotton for Archie\u2019s gin. When Archie leaves to take care of the cotton, Silva\u2014an Italian and exotic in those parts\u2014tries to trick Baby Doll into revealing her husband\u2019s role in the fire, and, as New York Times<\/em> reviewer Charles Isherwood<\/a> says, \u201cwe can practically see her little mind clicking along a few beats behind her tongue.\u201d<\/p>\n

The comedy in the play comes not from Neil Simon-style one-liners, but out of the human absurdities of normal, everyday action and impulse. In a post-show discussion, the actors said Mann insists they play their lines straight; playing for laughs would cheapen the effect. That earnestness is what makes the four characters\u2014Baby Doll (Susannah Hoffman), Archie Lee (Robert Joy), Silva (Dylan McDermott), and Baby Doll\u2019s Aunt Rose Comfort (Patricia Conolly)\u2014so believable. While you\u2019re chuckling, your heart is twisting. The play ends on a bit of a Scarlett O\u2019Hara moment, with Baby Doll\u2019s resolution to let tomorrow take care of itself.<\/p>\n

Veteran actor Patricia Conolly talked about some of the similarities between the elderly, half-deaf, semi-oblivious maiden aunt she plays here and other Williams characters she\u2019s portrayed. Such women live on the edges of family and society, and they must make enormous effort to \u201cget along,\u201d even with the most demanding hosts (\u201cI have always depended on the kindness of strangers,\u201d Blanche DuBois says.) Otherwise, as Aunt Rose Comfort puts the problem, they \u201chave no place to go.\u201d (Aunt Rose is a secondary character who manages to put a monkey wrench in situations fairly often, being where she shouldn\u2019t be or not being where she should be. And, if you\u2019ve ever had an elderly relative who\u2019s become hard-of-hearing, you\u2019ll know Williams got it right: she hears what she wants to hear!)<\/p>\n

At only 90 minutes, Baby Doll<\/em> is not as complex as Williams\u2019s Big 3: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Streetcar Named Desire, <\/em>and The Glass Menagerie<\/em>, but it\u2019s well worth adding to your Williams experience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Perhaps Tennessee Williams and comedy don\u2019t usually share your same mind-space, but here is a comedy-drama rather neglected in the back of his vast repository of work. Princeton\u2019s McCarter Theatre (link includes a behind the scenes video) has found it, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Baby Doll--McCarter Theatre's Season Opener - a Tennessee Williams comedy(yes!)-drama","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[272,366,104,147],"tags":[329],"class_list":["post-4856","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comedy","category-drama","category-the-morgue","category-theater","tag-mccarter-theatre"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1gk","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4856"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4856\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4859,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4856\/revisions\/4859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}